Way to Russia Talk Lounge

hpesch · Frequent Guest Joined: 09 Mar 2008 Posts: 18

We traveled in July in Petersburg, Novosibirsk, Barnaul and the Altai mountains. I interrogated this site extensively, but some facts were not covered. So I thought I might report my findings here.

When you travel in Russia from place to place it is possible, that at some stage you get into bit of trouble because your visa was not registered. Registering is obligatory for stays longer than 3 days, but it is a good idea to do it at the first stay in a hotel.
When travelling by train take into account that all time tables are Moscow time. When buing train tickets you need your passport, your name and data will be printed on the ticket! So you cannot send one person to buy tickets for the whole group unless she has all the passports.

There are more hotels in every place than you see on the net, and there is practically no need to book in advance, at least outside Moscow.
When your route brings you within 50 km of the border there will be a control post, where all passports are checked. Do not photograph or video officials or the control post, they can put up a long interview with you.

Be prepared to listen to Russian pop music at high volume or Russian video at all public places, in busses, trains, cafes... They love Tom and Jerry for some reason, and I have seen more movies of the Osobennosti natsionalnoy whatsoever -series than I would have liked.